[FEATURED INTERVIEW] Elenora

INTERVIEW W/ Nicholas Taylor (Drums) by Nicholas Senior

Could you identify yourself for our readers?

My name is Nicholas M. Taylor and I play drums for the band Elenora.

How would you describe your band to someone who hasn’t heard of Elenora before?

I guess if Chiodos and Emarosa had conceived a child together.. that’s where we’d lie. We’d like to think of ourselves as a pop band, but we like “chuggy” guitars from time to time and I like to use a lot of double-bass in my drumming.

Off the top of your head, which albums really got you into music?

Oh, man… I’d have to say that one of the first was Eiffel 65′s “Europop”, back when I was 9 or so. No joke, that and Smashmouth’s “Astro Lounge”. I had them both on cassette and I wore them out from playing them so much. After that, it was Blink 182′s “Take of Your Pants and Jacket” and New Found Glory’s self-titled. I was pretty hooked from there, and I think my musical tastes have only gotten weirder.

You are releasing a new EP on August 10th entitled Avant-Garde, which is a French phrase for something innovative or experimental. Does that title have particular meaning to you guys as a band? What triggered that choice as the album’s title?

We had been toying with calling it “Transitions” before we stumbled upon the idea of “Avant-Garde”. The idea was that we really wanted for anyone who was a fan of our old EP “In Reality I Am” to know what they were in for. We took a very different direction this time around, so really it was about pushing our own boundaries as a group a little bit as well.

Where did you guys record and with whom? How was the experience?

It was a roller coaster. We started off recording with Ryan Furlott at Rain City Audio in Tigard, Oregon. That was back in February. While we were in pre-production, our guitarist Kurt almost died. Had he not gone to the hospital for a third time, we would have lost him. As it turned out, he had had a rare form of cancer called Burkitt’s Lymphoma. We were all pretty shaken up, and we ended up having to put a stop on things until late May. Thanks to the cancer treatment center at OHSU, he was able to come in and record his parts in May and later that month, we got it done. Having that extra time to reflect, though, really helped us get to a better place with the vocal parts.

How do you feel about the finished product? What do you see the band doing differently, if anything, on a future full-length?

I’m extremely proud of what we were able to do. I know I speak for all of us when I say that we put our hearts into that record. That said, we’re already writing some more songs for the full-length. We’ve gotten so close as a band in the past 6 months that I think the focus for the record will be to experiment a lot more with the writing process. We have 4 members of the band who all play guitar, and I’m not the only person in the group who can play drums, so there’s a good chance that our fans will see a lot more variation in the upcoming songs.

Do you have any touring plans lined up for the rest of the Summer or in the Fall?

We’re jumping on some dates with Apollo, For the Sake Of, and Her Death and After directly following our CD release on August 10. We’re in talks with management about some bigger stuff in October as well. By 2013, we plan on touring full-time.

Which track was the easiest to write and record? Which was hardest? Why?

I think that “Bedfellow” came really easy for almost all of us, because it was just so much fun to play. It came together smoothly, and we all liked it so much that we were pretty tight on it when we entered the studio. The hardest song to record was a song called “Blessed are the Forgetful”, which we ultimately decided to scrap for the EP. It had some good parts which we’ll definitely be using, but it was like pulling teeth trying to get through recording it.

What bands influence Elenora?

A couple of us in the band are a few years older, so I know that Silverstein and Finch are/were a big influence. We all loved Chiodos growing up, and I think them and Emarosa shine through in our vocals the most. A lot of us are listening to some of the more experimental groups now, such as I the Mighty, Closure in Moscow, A Lot Like Birds…

You recently joined forces with Persistent Heart Media. How did that happen?

We were in talks with PHM initially for promotional purposes. We knew we needed a little bit of help spreading the word because we really wanted to make this release as big as possible. Eventually we were approached about the digital release being handled through PHM and we were thrilled.

You have a CD Release show August 10th. Could you tell us about it?

It’s going to be at the WOWhall in Eugene, Oregon. We’re playing with Apollo, Her Death and After, and For the Sake Of. They’re some of our best friends, and the WOWhall is our favorite venue so it’ll be a great night. Presale tickets are $8 and they’re being sold a bunch of places in Eugene, or it’s $10 at the door.

What kind of lyrical themes do you discuss on this new album?

We mostly talk about love and loss. I say that loosely, because some lyrical ideas tend to stray pretty far away from that, but that’s the core of it. We sometimes like to hide a few things in the lyrics, but I won’t go into that too much.